Welcome to my personal blog on Microsoft Dynamics AX. This site has posts with AX, its related technologies and contains some X++ Codes for use in your day to day use which came out of my research. However,Use them at your own discretion.All content provided on this blog is for informational purpose only.I am solely responsible for all content published here and any views or opinions expressed here are strictly my own and does not represent or reflect my employer.

Sunday, May 25, 2014

Thelatest upgrade guideis very well written and covers the complete upgrade process.
However, I am listing down an overview of the upgrade process and things to remember before starting the upgrade. I hope, this shall enable you to achieve a smooth upgrade.

Things to remember
before starting the R2 to R3 Upgrade

Before installing AX 2012 R3, All R2 components
needs to be uninstalled in the environment in which the upgrade is planned.

During the code & data upgrade process, Make
sure that you Mark all the steps in the code/data upgrade checklist before you
restart AX client/AOS as complete even though it is not yet completed else a
blank(empty) start up application workspace will be displayed and no modules
will be listed when you re-open the AX client.

Always compile the application using command “axbuild
xppcompileall” from the command prompt whenever compilation is required during
Code/data upgrade process.

Please make sure that the below steps are followed else during the data
upgrade, the pre-sync and post-sync jobs might struck in ‘Ready’ status and may
not be executed.

a.The user account
logging into the Dynamics AX client to run the checklist is the Dynamics AX
admin account and NOT just a member of the system administrator security
role.

b.Check the userinfo table in SQL: select * from userinfo where ID =
'admin' to make sure a record for the
"admin" ID has a valid SID, networkdomain, and
networkalias for each partition in the environment.

c.Check the batch form directly in the client by going to System
Administration | Batch Jobs | Batch Jobs and check the Createdby fields and if
the DataUpdate job has already scheduled as an account other than
admin, you need to start the upgrade over by logging in as the
admin account or you may be able to change the records in the batch and
batchjob tables to be the admin account.

d.Remove any records in the SysServerSessions table that are not valid in
this environment, you should do this while the AOS servers are stopped and
make sure to have a SQL backup first.

e.Check the setup under system administration | setup | system | Server
configuration

f.Delete any AOS instances here that are not valid in this environment.

g.Make sure the remaining AOS instance is marked “is batch server”

h.Make sure batch server schedule is setup with proper start/end time i.e.
Start time 12:00:00 am end time 11:59:59, so there are no gaps in the scheduled
time.

i.Make sure that the remaining valid AOS server that is also marked for
batch has the blank batch group and data Update batch group assigned to it.

j.Change the status of any other batch jobs from waiting to withhold so
they don't interfere with the Data Upgrade batch jobs. To change the
status highlight the jobs you want to change and select Functions | Change
Status and choose Withhold

k.Check for any previously running batch jobs that are stuck in a status
of Executing. You may need to change the status to cancelled or remove
the Job from the Batch and Batchjob table from the SQL backup.

Step 3. Restore the model and business data databases in a
new environment.

Step 4. Start the AX 2012 R3 installation setup on a new
environment.

Step 5. Select only the databases component.

Step 6. Select configure existing databases.

Step 7. In this step, Assign the R2 database and make sure that the Baseline database name field is left
blank during this procedure.

Step 8. On the Select additional models page, select the
Foundation model, Foundation Upgrade model, and any other models that you
require for your deployment. Select the Foundation Labels model only if you are
using country/region-specific features.

After this
step, the system creates a new baseline database which contains upgraded AX
2012 R3 models in the SYS, GLS, FPK, and SLN layers and Non-upgraded customer
models in the ISV, VAR, CUS, and USR layers.

Step 9. Now
install all other required AX components.

Step 10.
Now, assign the database and upgraded baseline database in this step.

Step 11. Once, the installation is completed then compile
the whole application using the command “axbuild xppcompileall” from the
command prompt. This compiled the whole application for me in just 30 to 40
minutes.

In AX 2009, We had an option of importing the new objects with ids using xpo from one layer to another. However, In AX 2012, The object ids are installation specific and we do not have an option to import them with object ids and this may affect in losing the data. The work around steps to move objects from one layer to another and still retain the old objects is as below:

Step 1. Create a new model and
create a CUS layer project in this new model.

Step 2. Move all the CUS layer
objects into this new model and export the project as an xpo.